Rebuild These Shattered Lives
by celticProtagonist
Summary: Ripped from the emptiness of the Void, Tomix is reunited with Karin at last. Much has happened since he fell and war for the fate of magic on Lore is brewing on the horizon, but the world can wait long enough for long lost lovers to meet again.


Last time was angst, this time is comfort. These poor kids need a break after everything that's gone down, and damnit I need things to be alright. This is officially an Everything Is Okay AU because this ship is my lifeblood.

Takes place sometime after the Gathering Shadow arc.

* * *

The world shrieked and twisted as the Void intruded into the material plane, ripping open the fabric of reality just long enough to spit Tomix out into the grass. He writhed, every reconstituted nerve screaming against the sudden exposure of light and air, his senses overloaded with stimulus.

His body ( _his_ body, made of flesh and blood and bone and feeling too tight and too large and painful and foreign and wonderful all at the same time) struggled to remember all the delicate intricacies that kept him alive, but with the first desperate gasp of air it slowly started to recall. His lungs inflated, heart pumping sluggish blood under new-tight skin. His blind eyes burned, and so he blinked. The piercing light slowly dimmed and sight returned, the world beginning as a runny watercolor and gaining definition, highlights and shadows until he could pick out the blades of grass beneath his cheek and the shade of the tree over his head.

He didn't even try to move for a long time, letting the warmth of the sun leech into his back and hardly believing that any of this was real. As he listened to the birds sing and smell the earthy scent of things growing he could only think that this was a very convincing illusion. Things didn't simply reappearing after falling into the Void.

Eventually his neck started to ache from its odd angle and so with a strained groan he managed to push himself onto his back so that he stared up into the boughs of the tree above. For a while he just looked, taking the the shifting gold of the leaves as the rustled and the slivers of the blue sky beyond. He scrunched the grass between his fingers. Tomix blinked.

Slowly, and with some difficulty, he raised his arm before his face. There at the end of his wrist was a hand; a wide, pale palm with four trembling fingers and a thumb. Each digit twitched on command. As Tomix watched them he felt something bubble up in his chest and tumble out as a chuckle. The laughter came faster and louder until his eyes began to water and spill over. He slung an arm across his face and laughed and cried until he couldn't breathe, taking gasping lungfuls of sweet, sweet air.

Eventually the laughter died away, his fingers exploring his face for the first time in more than five years. The scar tissue across his nose was still there and his jaw was peppered with stubble and he couldn't help but wonder what he actually looked like now.

"Getting reacquainted?" a voice asked, and Tomix flinched as his contemplative peace was shattered. He propped himself up on shaky elbows, realizing for the first time that he was lying on a small hillock, and watched a tall man in a blue robe approach him from below.

"So, this is where it put you," he said, peering around the little hilltop before his gaze rested at the base of the tree. "Appropriate, I suppose. This _is_ where they buried you, after all."

It took Tomix a moment to figure out what he was talking about. As it dawned on him, he whipped his head around fast enough to make his head ache and followed the man's eyes. At the base of the tree was a carved stone, its base leaden with flowers both fresh and wilted. Chisled into the surface was a name. His name. "Tomix Danao".

He turned back to the man, finding him standing beside him, hands folded behind his back with his eyes on the headstone. Between the blue robe, silver hair and sour expression, Tomix found that he actually recognized him.

"You're Warlic, aren't you?" he asked, startled by the sound of his own voice.

"I am," Warlic replied, still gazing ruefully at the grave, but didn't offer anything else.

Tomix grasped for an explanation for why the Blue Mage of all people would be the one to appear before him. So he asked him the first question that came to mind.

"Is this real?"

"I would certainly hope so after all I did to bring you here", Warlic told him. His voice was airy, but there was an underlying bitter tension to it.

"You? Why-"

"Please don't misunderstand me," Warlic cut him off with something close to a snarl, "I didn't do this for you." He looked up into the trees but his eyes were distant. "I did this for _Her_."

Tomix felt his heart jump into his throat. With the weight given to the word, Warlic could only be referring to one person. "What?" he croaked, fearing the hope that was beginning to rise within him.

"I owe her that much at least," Warlic said, mostly to himself before, with a shake, he seemed to remember where he was. "Well, she should be here soon enough. I suppose you should think of what you want to say to her."

"Wait-!" with a few false starts he managed to scramble to his feet, but when he looked up Warlic was gone, not leaving so much as a set of footprints in the grass. Tomix could almost be convinced that he had imagined the whole exchange.

On his feet for the first time the blood rushed from his head and he swayed, blinking rapidly to chase the black spots from his eyes. Looking properly down at himself he found that the only thing missing was his coat. The loss of the weight across his shoulders was strangely reassuring.

…How had he gotten here? He knew Warlic was powerful, but to call a soul from beyond the void and give it form? He felt as though he were missing something.

He looked up at the sound of grass crunching beneath a pair of feet and very nearly swallowed his own tongue. Mounting the hill, bereft of her armor, eyes lowered and shoulders slumped, was Karin. In her hands was a bouquet of yellow flowers, the same as the ones laid beneath the grave, her fingers picking sullenly at the petals. She hadn't noticed him. Tomix stood rooted to the spot, unable to think of what he would say even if his heart wasn't in his throat. Karin saved him the trouble.

She raised her head, met his eyes, and dropped the bouquet, a startled gasp escaping her even as her hand flew to the pommel of the sword still strapped around her waist. Her eyes were wide, face drained of color as through she had seen a ghost. For her that was probably exactly what was happening.

The hilltop was completely silent as the two just stared at one another. Tomix could see the thoughts whirling behind her dark eyes as they flicked back and forth across his face. Her stance had her coiled like a spring, the white knuckled grip on her sword and the tension in her jaw telling that she was ready to kill him if he made one wrong move. She had never seemed more beautiful.

"Karin…" he croaked out at last, feeling his heart swelling like the tears that threatened to spill over. She flinched at the sound of his voice, took an involuntary step back, tentative hope and intense suspicion warring across her face.

"Are-" she stopped herself, swallowed thickly. "Are you… real?"

Tomix shrugged, a giddy smile beginning to tug at his lips. "If I'm being honest, I would really like to know that myself," he said.

Karin didn't reply, her brows drawing down in confusion. Her grip on the sword loosened and she took a small step toward him. Once within arms reach she stretched out a shaking hand. Her fingers brushed against his jaw, the contact raising goosebumps along his arms and a shuddering breath from his chest. Karin blinked, suspicion drowning in a sudden rush of tears and she pressed her hand fully against his face, feeling the texture of his skin beneath her fingertips.

"Avatars…" she whispered, hoarse with utter disbelief. "Tomix… _Tomix…_ How- what-" she choked around a sob, tears finally spilling over, and raised her other hand to cup his face.

He was crying too, half sniffling and half laughing as he reached up and covered one of her hands with his own, pushing his cheek further into her palm. Karin's eyes followed the movement and, with deliberate slowness, moved her hands down to grip his elbows, taking in the two perfectly restored hands that lay between them.

Her shoulders began to shake, eyes screwing up against the torrent of tears that streamed from her face, and Karin let out a good and proper wail. Her legs gave out from underneath her and Tomix's own weakened limbs couldn't help but do the same. Together they crumpled onto the grass, Karin's bowed head hidden behind a curtain of red hair as she cried her heart out, the two of them clinging to one another's arms like rafts in a storm.

Tomix's forehead pressed against hers, his hands finding her face and relishing the heat of her skin beneath his palms. He tucked the long locks of her hair behind her ear, wiped the tear tracks from her blotchy cheeks. Bloodshot eyes stared back with endless wonder and growing need. Her hands reached back up, grabbed roughly around the back of his neck and pulled him down for a kiss that stole the breath from his lungs. The feel of her flooded his still tender senses and for just a moment she was all that existed.

In time they came up for air, gasping and exhausted. A wheezing laugh escaped Karin. "I swear," she croaked, "if this is a dream I'm going to be very upset when I wake up."

"That would make two of us," Tomix replied. "But I could rest easy, knowing that I got to touch you at least once."

Karin sighed and leaned her weight against his shoulder, sniffling and wiping at her face. The solidness of her body was the greatest comfort. "Avatars Tomix, _how?_ " she said. "I _saw_ you fall, they said you were gone, I-" she cut off, busying herself with tracing the lines of his palm. "You have hands and everything," she looked up and raked a hand through his hair, "and your hair's gone a bit red too."

"Has it?" his own hand reached up to touch his hair. He'd have to find a mirror at some point. He sighed and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I don't think I could explain it if I tried, my love. But it was Warlic who brought me back apparently."

"Warlic?" she echoed, "Why would _Warlic_ of all people go to the trouble?" She sounded bitter, much like Warlic himself had.

"He said he owed it to you."

Karin snorted. "Damn right he does," she grumbled. "I guess I should thank him though, if I can ever track the bastard down."

"I assume you two haven't spoken since-" he left the rest of it hanging. Karin didn't need to be reminded.

She sighed. "We're not really on speaking terms right now," she said, picking at the hem of her tunic. She seemed to fold in on herself. "Lots of things have happened since you've been gone Tomix. Lots of not-good things," she said in a small voice.

He pressed against her and settled his chin on top of her head. "The way I see it, is that you're still here, Karin. And so long as you continue to still be here nothing will be able to stop you." He slipped an arm around her waist. She threaded her fingers through his. "And now, I can be there at your back if ever you need me."

"Well that's good," she replied, settling back and letting some of the tension drain out of her, "because I feel like I could use all the help I can get." She sighed, this time with contentment. "Right now though, _this_ is all I need."

For a long while they simply sat together, pressed hard against one another as though afraid that the other would disappear. Karin eventually sighed and stood, still keeping a firm grip on his hand. She pulled him to his feet, catching him when his legs shook beneath him. Tomix let her take his weight, leaning into her as she effortlessly held him up. Together they left the tree and the grave behind and back into a world at war, but with their hands on each other's backs it didn't feel quite so heavy.


End file.
